


Stay Away

by gentlemanadventurer



Series: Strike That/Reverse It [1]
Category: Le Petit Chaperon Rouge | Little Red Riding Hood - Charles Perrault, Little Red Riding Hood (Fairy Tale), Rotkäppchen | Little Red Riding Hood (Fairy Tale)
Genre: Witches, backwards fairy tale, reimagined fairy tale, reversal
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-06
Updated: 2017-07-06
Packaged: 2018-11-28 17:11:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 725
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11422458
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gentlemanadventurer/pseuds/gentlemanadventurer
Summary: A fairy tale told backwards. The LRRH edition.





	Stay Away

Once upon a time, there was a wolf. Having lost her pack to human hunters and her heart to a long-missing stranger, she lived alone in the woods and was many months with child. After a long and bloody birth, she held her infant daughter in her arms for the first time and licked her cheek tenderly. Though she loved her daughter with all her heart, the birth had been too difficult. _Rocks are tearing at me as I move_ , she whispered to the witchwoman who had helped with the birth. _Please, keep her safe_. She had breath enough to beg.

The witchwoman was a solitary creature and lived alone in a small stone cottage thatched with human hair, disguised from prying human eyes. _I will keep your daughter, and I will keep her safe_. Comforted by that knowledge, the wolf stroked her daughter’s hair for the last time.

The wise woman cleaned the blood—red, so red—from the infant’s wispy hair and tucked her into a basket to keep her safe. Carefully, she built a cairn of stones around the body of the wolf who had so loved her child. Then she picked up the basket and carried her new godchild home.

The girl grew up headstrong but sweet. She cared for her godmother’s small garden and learned to brew the medicines that the creatures of the forests relied on. Half-wolf as she was, she always had a look of the dark, untamed places about her, and she often ventured into the woods to meet with the monsters who lived there and hear their stories. _But_ , her godmother warned her, _stay away from the path_. For there are travelers on the path who may be afraid of a strange wild girl or, even worse, be tempted by her savage beauty, by the promise of her sharp teeth and dark eyes.

One day she was given a small pack with coarse-woven bandages and a salve that smelled of words she could not pronounce. _Take this to the clearing across the river near the smiling oak,_ her godmother told her. _There is a man there who is injured and, in his pain, is lashing out at the innocent creatures there. The sooner he is gone from our woods, the better._

 _Do not speak to him_ , her godmother warned. _For humans weave lies with their words and their looks and will trick you. Move quietly and leave the pack for him to find._

And so the girl set off into the forest, fading through the dappled shadows in her cloak of brown. The man was a hunter, she saw as she watched him, with his weapon on the ground beside him. He sat, slumped, in the shadow of an elm and swore quietly as he fussed with a bleeding wound on his leg. His scent—of smoke and brick and other things she could not name—was strong. She waited until his eyes were averted and slipped the pack in next to him. She remained until she saw him find it. _Thank you,_ he whispered to the trees, the wind, the sleeping stone of the silent clearing. Then she left, as she had promised.

But her curiosity grew sharply overnight, returning again and again to gnaw at her belly. She found herself sneaking off to check on the hunter, even as her godmother watched with despairing eyes. And one afternoon she returned to the small stone cottage and sat sadly at the rough kitchen table. _He left._

Her godmother smiled. _I will not pretend to be sorry._

Yet it was not enough, and the girl found herself unsatisfied by the moss-covered caves and hidden places. She began to venture closer to the road through the forest, watching the merchants with their carts, examining their strange garments and unfamiliar animals from a distance. Some smelled of spices, of salt wind and far-off places and her tongue would dart out as if to taste the very air.

Once upon a time, a farmer returning from the far market saw a barefoot young woman with an uncanny look. She stood on the road, looking curious and lost in equal measure. A kind-hearted man, he gave her his grown daughter’s old red cape and ushered her onto the bench beside him. 

* * *

 

Once upon a time, she did not come home.


End file.
